<h1>Roles</h1>

<p> 
A role is a collection of permissions defined for the whole system 
that you can assign to specific users in specific contexts.
</p>

<p>
For example, you may have a Role called "Teacher" that is set up to 
allow teachers to do certain things (and not others).   Once this role
exists, you can assign it to someone in a course to make them a "Teacher"
for that course.  You could also assign the role to a user in the 
course category to make them a "Teacher" for all the courses under that
category, or assign the role to a user just in a single forum, giving 
that user those capabilities just in that forum.
</p>
  
<p>
A role must have a <strong>name</strong>.  If you need to name the role for multiple 
languages you can use multilang syntax if you wish, such as <pre>
  &lt;span lang="en"&gt;Teacher&lt;/span&gt; 
  &lt;span lang="es_es"&gt;Profesor&lt;/span&gt; 
  </pre>If you do this make sure the setting to "filter strings" is on for your installation.
</p>

<p>
The <strong>shortname</strong> is necessary for other plugins in Moodle that may need
to refer to your Roles (eg when uploading users from a file or setting 
enrolments via an enrolment plugin).
</p>

<p>
The <strong>description</strong> is simply to describe the role in your own words, so 
that everyone has a common understanding about the role.
</p>

<p>
See also 
<a href="help.php?file=contexts.html">Contexts</a>,
<a href="help.php?file=permissions.html">Permissions</a>,
<a href="help.php?file=assignroles.html">Assign Roles</a> and
<a href="help.php?file=overrides.html">Overrides</a>.
</p>
